Welcome! The purpose of this blog is to encourage followers of Jesus Christ to have daily time in which they intimately connect with the Lord Jesus. It includes an aspect of praise to God, some of how I sense the Lord speaking to me, and then a topic for prayer. My hope is that this blog will help you in three ways;

1. A balanced spiritual diet of Scripture reading - Using the lectionary readings for the day, this will give you a balance of passages from the Psalms, the Old Testament, the New Testament Epistles and the Gospels.Don't feel obliged to read all the passages ... unless you have the time and the inclination!

2. An example of Spiritual Journaling - I have committed to write this daily post, not for teaching purposes but as my daily spiritual journal, sharing what I hear from the Lord and how I experience Him with me each day.

3. An online discipler – One of the reasons that so many Christians do not have daily devotion is because they do not have a discipler. A discipler can help them build up this basic element of discipleship when they first become Christians. The best way for you is to have a discipler to walk with you for a certain period of time so that daily devotion become a good habit. Or, you may have a group of 2 or 3 people to encourage and be accountable to each other so that you won’t stop your daily devotion. I offer myself as your online disciple to walk with you daily to enrich your spiritual journey, trusting that you will in time, offer yourself to others.

So let us start this journey with Jesus our Lord . . . click here for today's readings

Friday, February 26, 2010

Why does he eat with .. sinners?

Praise: God the Liberator. "I will praise You because 'you are my help and my deliverer, O LORD'" (Psalm 70:5)

Scripture: Jesus was often found just hanging out at the house of people the religious types of the day called "sinners". I love the fact that having just impacted one of these sinners (Matthew the tax collector), and called him to follow him, he then wants to hang out with Matthew at his place with his friends. How else would he be able to have the opportunity to connect with those who 'need' him? How easily would we find ourselves encouraging Matthew not to spend too much time with his old friends who were a bad influence. Not so Jesus, the "friend of sinners".

I want to be able to connect with people in a similar way, without prejudice Lord. If my life/body is truly a temple of the Holy Spirit as we read in Corinthians, then could it be that you want me to express this reality to people who don't yet know the Lord. Interestingly I also found the story about Joseph helpful in this. Here he is stuck in prison, unjustly. Yet he is never without opportunity to impact people with the Lord. He shows concern for the cup-bearer and baker. He asks them why they seem upset and then has opportunity to share some truth about God (all dreams belong to him) but also to demonstrate the truth by inviting them to share their dreams trusting that God would supernaturally work through him. So he did, even though it didn't immediately lead to his release. That would come later but God still had purpose in keeping Joseph where he was.

Lord, let me not be too preoccupied with what might seem to be going wrong with my situation, but more concerned about the people around me and what you are doing and want to do in their lives through me.

Prayer: Pray for the strengthening of marriages. Pray that couples will honor and care for one another in the love of Christ. Ask God to bless and heal those whom he has joined together, that nothing would drive them apart.
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1 comment:

  1. stephanie_pressApril 19, 2010 at 12:09 PM

    I really like how you draw in the story of Joseph here. It is very clear when you see this parallel between the Lord and Joseph, but is that the first thing you think when you read the story? Not so for me. Thanks for the reminder that it doesn't matter the place you are at, sometimes that is where God needs you to do his work.

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